Honda Produces Micro Commuter EV

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Meet Japan's take on the urban electric car.

The Smart car may have seemed anything but when it was first introduced, but these days it has plenty of imitators. Toyota has its iQ (also sold as a Scion and an Aston Martin), Renault has its Twizy, and now Honda has revealed its Micro Commuter. Initially unveiled in concept form a year ago, the Micro Commuter has now been revealed in production guise. Like the Twizy, it features tandem seating (but with two small seats in the back) for a narrow shape that's just 1.25 meters wide, 2.5 meters long and 1.45 meters tall.

It's powered by an electric motor mounted in the back that can take it up to 50 mph and to a maximum range of 37 miles. Instead of conventional gauges, the Micro Commuter has a tablet that docks behind the steering wheel. Developed to comply with new Japanese regulations, the little electric Honda is built atop a "variable design platform", which means that Honda could build different body-styles based on the same architecture.